Lead Story | Self-Publishing Review

Waiting For Spring: An Interview with R.J. Keller

This past summer I started writing a monthly feature called “Word Machines,” in which I would feature a fellow unknown writer and their work with my network of readers. When the opportunity arose to take over editorial duties for this site, I mentioned to Henry that I’d like to shift the Word Machines feature over here as well. SPR has a lot more traffic and readers than my humble blog, and I think it would better service the talent I want to showcase here.

Since I began digging into the indie scene, one name kept popping up: R.J. Keller, […]

Todd Keisling2017-03-24T09:23:43+02:00January 10th, 2011|Categories: Interviews, Lead Story|

A Life Transparent: An Interview with Todd Keisling

Todd Keisling is the author of the very excellent A Life Transparent, just released via Lightning Source. He’s also going to be taking on some of the editorial duties at SPR, so check out this interview to find out about his novel, his thoughts on writing, and what he hopes to achieve with the site.

About the novel:

He is the consummate husband. Stable, hard-working, and dedicated to his wife, Donovan is a paragon of the Middle Class.

Until now.

Strange visions of a monochromatic world. Bizarre sensations of physical transparency. At first, Donovan fears he’s losing his grip

[…]

Henry Baum2011-10-08T16:34:14+02:00January 10th, 2011|Categories: Interviews, Lead Story|

A Self-Published Short Story for Charity

A post from Inside the Writers Studio:

Craig Lancaster, author of the widely praised 600 Hours of Edward and the forthcoming novel The Summer Son (to be released by AmazonEncore in early 2011) wanted to do something for others this Christmas season, so he wrote a fantastic holiday-themed story, “Comfort and Joy,” to sell on Amazon and Smashwords for $1.

However, that he plans to donate 100% of the proceeds to Feeding America, whose 200+ food banks distribute to all fifty states, wasn’t enough for us at Inside the Writers’ Studio. When we learned of his […]

Kristen Tsetsi2011-10-08T16:40:06+02:00December 8th, 2010|Categories: Interviews, Lead Story|

Operation Concrete: An Interview with Richard Galbraith

Concrete Operational by Richard Galbraith (and others) is the most ambitious project ever covered by Self-Publishing Review. In fact, it might be the most ambitious project I’ve ever seen of its kind, self-published or not. It combines a novel, art book, and CD in one package, all centered around a single story – a plausibly prophetic vision of the future. About the novel:

Germany Germany, a man who was free, a man who loved, now an instrument in their machine. They have turned him into the very thing he hates, what he and everyone he loved fought against, the

[…]

Henry Baum2011-10-08T17:15:21+02:00November 4th, 2010|Categories: Interviews, Lead Story|

Social Media Won’t Sell Your Books

Many social media gurus will tell you a Twitter feed can cure cancer. Maybe I’m uninformed and this is true – I can’t be sure.

One thing I do know is that social media sites were not created to sell books simply via their existence. This originally started out as a post focused on video, but I bloated it out to social media in general, because it really has to tie together in a nice big bow.

I’m going to lay out a bit of my thinking and rationale about this topic with regard to indie writers using these channels […]

Brian Spaeth2011-10-08T17:10:03+02:00October 4th, 2010|Categories: Lead Story, Resources|

Jane Friedman, Long-Time Publisher of Writer’s Digest, Talks with Self-Publishing Review

Image from Jane Friedmans "there are no rules" blog

I first met Jane Friedman sometime around June, 2001, when she called to tell me that my novel Acts of the Apostles had won the Writer’s Digest National Self-Published Book Award for that year (in the “genre” category: a juried competition with 324 entrants, ahem; I digress).

That call took place pretty early in Jane’s 12 year career at F+W Media (and pretty early in my self-publishing career, now that you mention it.) Her talent was obvious and she rose quickly. In 2008 she was named the publisher of Writer’s Digest, the No. 1 resource for working writers. In her […]

John Sundman2017-03-24T09:26:42+02:00August 25th, 2010|Categories: Lead Story|Tags: Writing Tips|

Tune in Tokyo: A Review and Interview with Tim Anderson

Tune in Tokyo: The Gaijin Diaries is the true-life tale of a slacker, gay, viola-playing, sardonic English teacher making his way through the wilds of Tokyo. You know you’re in for a good read when the promo materials for the book are funny. A lesson to writers – your promo materials can do a lot.

The memoir is about culture shock, the sometimes absurdity of Japanese culture, but it’s mostly about Tim Anderson’s unique lens into his experiences. The book is confidently and reliably funny. The humor doesn’t have a 100% success rate, but there are so many quips that […]

Henry Baum2011-10-08T17:19:29+02:00August 18th, 2010|Categories: Book Reviews, Interviews, Lead Story|

SPR interviews Mark Coker of Smashwords

Smashwords is a service for helping small and self-publishers format ebooks in diverse formats (for example: kindle, epub, PDF, Palm) and distribute them through diverse retail channels (for example Amazon, Apple, BN, Kobo, and Smashwords itself). A few weeks ago I sent Smashwords founder Mark Coker a note asking if I could interview him for my site Wetmachine & SelfPublishing Review. He said yes; I sent him some questions about the current & future state of book publishing, and he answered. His replies appear below the fold (cross-posted on Wetmachine yesterday).